


Like a King (Draped in his finery)

by Momokai



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Bottoming from the Top, Dark Will Graham, Established Relationship, Gift Fic, Hannibal Has All The Puns, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, Hannibal Lecter is the Chesapeake Ripper, Hannigram - Freeform, Japanese Rope Bondage, M/M, Murder Husbands, No Sharks Were Harmed In the Writing of This Fic, One Shot, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Post-Fall (Hannibal), Shibari, Will Graham Loves Hannibal Lecter, Will Has All The Metaphors, unbeta'd we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 18:50:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17493332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Momokai/pseuds/Momokai
Summary: “Do I cut you free?” He asks softly, trailing his finger down from Hannibal’s throat to the knot tied in the center of his chest, where all other threads eventually return. The heart. “Or leave you to languish in the fine chains I’ve bound you with?”





	Like a King (Draped in his finery)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BonesAndScales](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BonesAndScales/gifts).



> Minor edits: 22/01/19

The idea comes to him, as most do, while his hands are busy and his mind is a thousand miles away. 

He’d been threading rope to repair some of the larger nets with Nikolai and Ilya -a pair of brothers he’d taken to helping out on their fishing boat on occasion- when he’d glanced down at the off white rope looped around his wrist and idly wondered at something so simple having so much power. How mere fibres threaded together in a specific pattern could stimmy gravity itself, could capture and contain even the greatest of creatures. He’d heard the story of Ilya cutting a shark of monstrous proportions free of one of their nets too many times to count- at various levels of sobriety and embellishment.

He’d gone home that day with the image of powerful muscles straining futilely against lengths of artfully crafted rope, and wondered at the sense of power the mere  _ thought _ instilled in him.

The thing is, the image doesn’t leave him as most do. It imprints itself across the backs of his eyelids, dances between idle thoughts and creeps into his very dreams until it becomes a driving force in itself, steering his imagination in unexpected and previously unexplored directions. 

He decides to do a little research- and just like that, it all gains  _ substance,  _ and Will finds that he  _ wants. _

So he does more research, he practices and compares materials, and finds that one of his favourite hobbies gives him an unexpected edge, and shines a new light on it as a whole. It’s with a somewhat exasperating inevitability that he stumbles upon the artistry in this new thing, and he smiles quietly to himself as he expertly tightens a knot in a completed net. All he needs now is an opportunity.

Barely a week later, one presents itself. 

* * *

Will thinks that he quite loves the port city of Vladivostok. 

Russia had chafed at him at first; the newness, the sheer  _ alienness  _ of it more than he’d been able to stomach in the beginning. It was rare to find someone that spoke english with any level of fluidity, and he’d been forced to rely entirely on Hannibal for effective communication, -there were only so many rounds of charades Will or his unfortunate conversation partner were willing to play before one or the other lost their patience. 

Thankfully, Will’s empathy worked greatly in his favor these days. He picked up enough russian to carry basic conversation simply by way of deriving meaning and context through body language and all the things he read from those speaking around him. Hannibal, predictably, found the process fascinating, and took to teaching Will snippets of various languages just to see if he could bleed meaning not from the words, but from the one speaking them.

Will was entirely unsurprised by the french. Hannibal’s not-so-secret love affair with the place and language was practically a staple at this point. He always developed an amusing twitch on the rare occasions Will dusted off his Louisiana Creole.

They’ve been in Russia for nearly three years, moving from city to city every few months, with Vladivostok their longest stay yet at nearly eight months. Perhaps Hannibal had noticed Will’s appreciation of the place,  _ felt _ the gradual loosening beneath the empaths skin as he’d melted almost seamlessly into the life they’d carefully built there- As Isak and Marcel Frei.

Will, or  _ Marcel,  _ was never letting Hannibal pick the names again. Honestly, it was already obvious Hannibal found Jack’s persistence amusing, he didn’t need to go and  _ name himself  _ for it.  _ Isak Frei _ . How had this man alluded law enforcement for decades?

Their days are simple. Hannibal goes about his days as  _ Isak  _ teaching romantic literature of all things at a local college, and Will contents himself with relaxing in their apartments or wandering down to the docks to help Nikolai and Ilya when they need the spare set of hands. 

Their nights are usually just as simple. Hannibal prepares lavish dinners, Will selects a wine, and they bask in the other’s company in any way that pleases them- be it in silence, conversation or intimacy.

There are never nights more companionable however, than the nights they spend out in the dark, hunting those no better than swine. By this stage, they function as a well oiled machine- in tandem, as one, easily predicting the other and reacting accordingly, a dance they’ve dedicated their time and hearts to learning the steps to. Their dark waltz.

And Will has learned that there is never a more opportune time to surprise your partner with a new step, than the  _ finale _ .

There is still blood under their nails when they tumble naked into bed after one such night. Will a live wire, writhing with the energy breathed into him after they’ve killed together, and Hannibal a barely contained force of nature. They’re never more alive than in these moments, and it’s this moment that Will has been waiting for. 

Will cradles Hannibal between his thighs, the weight of him pressing the empath into the mattress as formidable teeth graze tenderly over the fluttering pulse in his neck and large hands curl possessively over his hips, thumbs digging into the hollows there. Hannibal’s skin is almost fever hot despite the chill in the air, and Will thinks to himself that anyone lesser might burn to ashes beneath it’s touch, like Icarus flying too close to the radiant sun.

He glides his palms down Hannibal’s bare sides, and he knows he is anything but lesser by the way the older man shivers between his hands, arching into Will’s touch like he might die without it, muscles shaped anew by the hunt rolling hot and liquid beneath his fingers, the softness from captivity nothing but a distant memory.

It had amazed and captivated Will in the beginning; how receptive Hannibal is to his touch despite the refined air of untouchability that seemed to shroud him like a fine cloak. How all those sharp angles soften beneath his fingers, become as close to malleable as they could ever possibly be- how they would  _ never  _ be for anyone else.  _ A beast gentled by loving touch- how the world would shudder upon its foundations if it knew.     _

It’s tempting to put thought aside and stay their current course, but tonight Will has plans and he wants to share them with Hannibal.

Serpent like, Will’s hand slithers unseen beneath the pillow above his head as he savors the devouring kiss Hannibal presses to his lips. He slides a leg higher up the older man’s hip and presses the foot of his other into the mattress before using the moment of distraction to flip their positions. Hannibal goes over easily, not resisting as Will sits astride his thighs and slowly unspools a length of black cotton rope between his hands. 

Maroon eyes fall instantly upon the black coils, and Will smiles almost coyly down at him as he fashions a complicated knot at one end of the rope. 

“I fear you’ve been keeping secrets from me, dear William.” Hannibal says at length, tone unreadable. Will’s coy smile curls upwards a little more at the edges, because he doesn’t need to  _ read  _ Hannibal to  _ know  _ him.

“I may have been flirting with the possibility of an idea that I… failed to mention, yes.” Will admits without shame- and Hannibal hums, amused and intrigued which is as much a green light as Will could ask for. “Come here.” He breathes, and is gratified when he is obeyed without hesitation or thought; Hannibal simply sitting up beneath him as if he is drawn by Will’s gravity. 

He catches Hannibal’s eye as he slowly passes a loop over his head, stares into depths of blood soaked earth as he twines rope around his hand and pulls it steadily taught. Hannibal’s Adam’s apple bobs, collared- and the image that has haunted Will for near a week is made reality. He can’t help but to tip forward and steal a kiss, chaste but no less intimate for the rope Will has tied around Hannibal’s throat. 

“Is this your design, Will? To see me collared and at your mercy?” Hannibal asks, and his voice is no more than a curious rumble, accent thick with arousal and Will finds his resolve tested as the words go right to his dick. When he’d hatched this plan, he hadn’t counted on his own patience failing him. He’d gone into this fully assured in his willingness to see his fantasy realized in full.

It figured he’d forgotten to factor  _ Hannibal  _ into the equation.

“Not quite.” He manages after swallowing thickly, and Hannibal’s eyes fall half lidded, content to wait as he kneads his thumbs into Will’s hips. The easy submission almost undoes him entirely, as it’s always prone to do, and Will quickly threads another knot in the rope to distract himself, pointedly ignoring the way his fingers tremble around the cotton fibres. 

The second knot is followed by three more, and under Hannibal’s curious eyes, Will wraps one loop over his right shoulder, and another over his left, before passing a loop around his torso, directly below his arms, which he then feeds into one of the larger knots over the center of his chest. The overall result is almost like an intricate harness, and Hannibal makes a pleased sound somewhere deep in his chest while Will admires his handiwork.

“Kinbaku-bi.” He all but purrs, “More commonly known as  _ Shibari _ . My Will, always so full of surprises.” Will hums, pleased and smug as he hooks a finger into one of the complicated knots at the hollow of the older man’s throat, and uses it to pull him into a kiss- this one much less chaste than the one before it. Hannibal’s hands curve around his hips to palm at his ass, and Will sighs contentedly into the kiss before abruptly pulling away- and is almost instantly buffeted with a curl of satisfaction as Hannibal leans in to follow before a hand against his bound chest stops him. The empath smirks once, briefly, as he slides from Hannibal’s lap. 

“On your knees.” He orders softly, and Hannibal’s eyes darken with heat as he does as commanded, rising to his knees wordlessly as Will shuffles around the bed until he’s kneeling behind the older man. There is a knot waiting for him at the base of Hannibal’s neck, resting over the top most knob of his spine, and Will bites his lip as he threads another length of rope through it- this one a deep, dark red. His knuckles graze fever hot skin, and they both shudder. 

The muscles in Hannibal’s back flex as the rope brushes against them, and Will’s mouth waters as he tightens another knot that he then connects to the length pulled taught across a solid shoulder. He repeats the process on the other side, before tying another knot, this one in the center of Hannibal’s spine, nearly behind his heart. 

“Ok?” He asks somewhat shakily after a moment. Hannibal’s neck flexes in response, the rope pulling tight against his skin as the muscles beneath expand and contract. 

“More than.” Hannibal replies lowly, and Will grins despite the way his heart feels like it’s going to beat right out of his chest. 

“Your arm then, Dr. Lecter.” He requests, to which his lover responds by curling his arm behind his back for Will to grasp gently at the wrist. He presses the back of Hannibal’s hand against the base of his own spine, tapping it once as a signal to keep it there before he trails his fingers up the broad expanse of the older man’s back, delighting in the gooseflesh that ripples out from his touch as his nails mark a light path to his left bicep, which he proceeds to pass one, two, three loops of rope around before pulling them tight enough to compress the skin, but loose enough to leave blood flow unchallenged. He secures the threads with a rounded knot before trailing his fingers down a few inches and repeating the three loops, finishing it with the same knot as the first. He continues the process down Hannibal’s arm until he reaches the man’s wrist, which he leaves bare. Will nudges the loose end of rope into Hannibal’s palm, and he obligingly closes his fingers over it to hold in place while Will glides a hand up his right side, brushing over his shoulder before continuing down his right arm, gently tugging it behind his back to join it’s brother. Will repeats the same series of loops and knots down Hannibal’s right arm, stopping once again at the wrist- only this time he takes both ends of the ropes and twines them together, before feeding them up through the series of intricate knots mimicking the knobs of Hannibal’s spine. They loop over the sides of his neck, before finishing in a single knot twined together just beneath the hollow of his throat.

The dark red blends beautifully with the deep black of the first rope, and Will swallows thickly, reminded viscerally of how blood turns black in the moonlight. Will allows himself to finally take in the fruit of his labour in its entirety, sliding from the edge of the bed to stand and slowly circle Hannibal, who had remained almost preternaturally still beneath Will’s hands. 

The soft cotton ropes are matt against the dim light of their bedroom, adding an exquisite contrast to the sweat glistening in a fine layer on Hannibal’s olive toned skin. His arms are held in place behind his back by a simple latticework of red punctuated by rounded knots that remind Will somewhat unerringly of pomegranate seeds. He finds that he’s particularly pleased with the braiding he’d worked into the ropes following the length of his spine, larger knots dotting the length at even intervals like charms on a decorative chain. The style allows the arms little to no movement save for the hands remaining free, and what would otherwise become an uncomfortable angle to maintain is alleviated by the crisscross of ropes pulled taught across the expanse of Hannibal’s chest, supporting the weight of the man’s arms and taking the strain from his shoulders-  _ If _ Will has done it right.

And judging by the heavy lidded look of barely restrained desire aimed in Will’s direction as he rounds the bed to Hannibal’s front, he’ll assume he has. The empath almost feels the need to check his knots, somewhat instinctively expecting the older man to suddenly pounce- which compels Will to make a mental note: bring enough rope to include the legs next time. And oh,  _ there is going to be a next time. _

“Comfy?” Will asks as he climbs back onto the bed, kneeling within arms reach of Hannibal- and it’s almost a shame that he’s the only one with a free pair of arms right now. Oh, the possibilities. 

“Perfectly.” Hannibal rumbles, and Will shivers. He swears the asshole does it on purpose. “You’ve done such a marvelous job I feel it’ll be some time yet before I reach the end of my tether.” Will blinks, then snorts. 

“Of course you make a fucking pun.” He sighs, rolling his eyes. Hannibal’s answering smile possesses too many teeth for polite company, and Will’s mouth is suddenly very dry. “Stop that.” He complains. Hannibal merely settles more on his knees, sitting back on his heels regally, looking less like a man trussed up in ropes and more like a king draped in finery- and hell if that doesn’t send a pleased curl of heat right down to WIll’s  _ toes. _

“Tell me what you see, Will.” Hannibal asks of him, and Will doesn’t think of the last person to speak those words to him, no, now it’s only ever Hannibal, and Will is never afraid to tell him.

“A king bedecked in jewels fit for a monster.” He breathes, and reaches forward to drag a single finger up the length of Hannibal’s stomach, nail catching over the scar left by the Dragon’s bullet, and passing over the strips of rope woven artfully across his chest. Hannibal, as he’s want to do, arches into his touch as the tide does the moon. It causes the ropes to pull tight across his chest and throat, and Will licks his lips as blue eyes lock onto the older man’s throat, watching enraptured as it works beneath the collar of black cotton. Will doesn’t fight the temptation to touch, and trails his fingers higher until he can brush the tips over the taught line pressing into Hannibal’s pulse. Hannibal’s eyes are dark pools of blood in the dim bedroom light, and Will thinks of Ilya’s shark, how he’d laboured to cut it free of the net.

“Do I cut you free?” He asks softly, trailing his finger down from Hannibal’s throat to the knot tied in the center of his chest, where all other threads eventually return. The heart. “Or leave you to languish in the fine chains I’ve bound you with?” Hannibal shudders visibly at his words, lips parting soundlessly on an exhale, and Will is almost overcome with the sense of power that rises up within him. 

“I fear I would not survive it, should you cut me free of my place prostrate before your altar.” Hannibal declares in a murmur, eyes dark and fixed on Will as if there were no finer art in existence, and Will’s breath stutters over a curse.

“ _ Fuck _ .” He all but throws himself back into Hannibal’s lap, straddling his thighs and pressing against him until he can feel the unforgiving edges of knots biting into the skin of his chest and chafing one of his nipples. He ignores it in favor of Hannibal’s mouth, sealing their lips together almost urgently and moaning when sharp teeth catch at his lower lip. It doesn’t occur to him to untie Hannibal- that would require time and focus that Will doesn’t otherwise possess anymore, and means undoing all his hard work before he gets to really enjoy the benefits. 

Hannibal is all fever hot skin and coiled muscle beneath him, and Will bares his teeth into the kiss, which is more nipping bites at this point anyway, and hisses;

“I wasn’t done.” He kind of was, but he’d wanted to have a little more fun with it before getting to the finale. But then Hannibal had to go and be Hannibal, and say the most profound and romantic things.

“Forgive me,” Hannibal exhales roughly against his cheek and rolls his shoulders, “I often find myself overcome in my devotion.” Will’s ears pick up the ominous creak of straining rope, and he grinds down on the hot, hard length beneath him with a shudder. “It seems to make me terribly rude.” Will throws a hand out into the ruffled sheets beneath them, searching as he responds;

“I forgive you.” It’s a bit of a forgone conclusion these days. Water is wet, the sky is blue, bears certainly do shit in the woods and Will Graham lets Hannibal Lecter get away with murder, but only if he gets to help.

Will makes a triumphant noise as his fingers nudge and wrap around their quarry, and he wastes no time in popping the cap on the tube of lubricant. He slicks a palm before droppingt the tube back into the sheets, and shifts to wrap wet fingers around Hannibal’s cock. The older man bucks into his grip, and Will tangles his free hand into the latticework of ropes adorning his chest for leverage as he gives Hannibal’s length a few torturous tugs that has the man straining against his intricate bindings. Once Will deems the lube sufficiently spread for his patience level, he rears up onto his knees, positions the head of Hannibal’s cock at his entrance and lowers himself onto it. They’ve done this enough times that Will’s body is long accustomed to the stretch, and recent enough that he escapes with no more than low burn that he finds pleasing, sighing as his ass settles onto the tops of his lovers thighs. 

Hannibal drops his forehead into Will’s collar bone, tawny locks sticking to both of them with sweat as he breathes somewhat raggedly against his chest. Will can see the movement in the ropes on Hannibal’s shoulders as he flexes his hands against his back, clearly desiring to touch, but unable to. He smirks above his lovers head and threads the fingers of his other hand in the ropes curving over Hannibal’s shoulder. The lattice work harness works beautifully as leverage for Will to roll his hips, and he groans appreciatively at the depth and fullness of Hannibal’s cock inside him. As much as he would like to draw this out, Will realizes that it’s a pipe dream after he’d existed in a state of low burn arousal for as long as it took him to tie Hannibal up. 

With that knowledge in mind, Will lifts himself up slowly, dropping his chin to nose briefly at Hannibal’s hair before abruptly fucking back down. They both moan on the exhale, and Will repeats the motion with barely a pause between them, groaning loudly as Hannibal bucks up into him as he comes down again, driving himself deeper. He’s not quite sure if it’s the lingering high from their hunt, or the newfound one he’d acquired by chaining his unchainable lover so artfully, but Will finds himself riding Hannibal harder than he has in some time, and delights in the vigor the older man reciprocates. For him, Will doubts it’s about the act of being restrained so much as simply  _ who  _ does the restraining. It’d be so like Hannibal to enjoy something simply because it’s  _ Will  _ doing it. 

Then again, he  _ did  _ let Will throw them off a cliff. 

Will gasps as Hannibal’s cock grazes his prostate, and angles himself for more while Hannibal himself presses a biting kiss into the side of his throat, sucking a mark over his rabbiting pulse as he drives upwards into the empaths body in perfect time. Will spares a thought that the older man’s shoulders will probably be sore in the morning- he’d done the supporting knots correctly, but the position isn’t one for… vigorous activity. It’s meant for immobility. 

And that’s nothing to say for the  _ marks  _ that are going to, without a doubt, bloom deep and red on Hannibal’s skin in places where the knots tighten against movement. Or where Will’s heaving body presses them harder into his chest- where _ his clawing hands pull them tight across his shoulders because he’s so close- _

This is usually when Hannibal would wrap a hand around Will’s aching length and tip him over the edge with a few sinful tugs- but Will knows he’ll have to do it himself this time, and he knows even before he does it that he’s going to make a show of it. 

Hannibal is murmuring praise and encouragement in broken english against the stubble on Will’s throat, and that more than anything tells Will how so very close his lover is as well, so Will releases the ropes on his right shoulder and slides his newly freed hand between their heaving bodies to stroke himself, and is gratified by the approving rumble that leaves Hannibal’s chest in response. Will fucks down on Hannibal’s cock and rolls his hips in a way he  _ knows  _ the older man likes, and stutters on a moan as the motion causes his lover’s length to grind gloriously against his prostate. Hannibal shudders and sinks his teeth into the meat of Will’s shoulder, not hard enough to break skin -this time-, but definitely hard enough to leave a mark, and the pain is so unexpected between the tight coils of pleasure wound to breaking point in Will that it causes the tension to snap, and his back arches with the force of it as he comes with a choked approximation of Hannibal’s name on his lips, eyes threatening to roll back into his head at the intensity. 

He knows Hannibal follows not a moment later by the way every muscle in his body locks up, straining breathtakingly against the ropes. The collar circling his throat has the unexpected side effect of making the tendon there stand out all the more as he strains from the force of his own climax, and if Will had had the energy; he would lean down and bite it.

As it stands, he barely has the wherewithal to slide gracelessly from Hannibal’s lap, shivering as his spent length slips from his body, to fumble for the folding knife he’d stashed under the pillow. Hannibal doesn’t move while Will gropes beneath the pillows, but his sides heave as he fights to regain his breath, sweat glistening wetly on his skin and sticking his hair to his face. He’s the very picture of a man debauched, and Will takes pride in his design.   

Will’s fingers close over the knife at last, and he wastes no time in shuffling up onto his knees behind his lover to flick open the blade and select a particular thread. He cuts it carefully- and just like that, a knot unravels and Hannibal’s arms drop to his sides. The older man sighs once before rolling his shoulders, and Will obligingly sets about slicing certain key ropes to untether his creation. He’s sad to see it go, but Will knows without a doubt that he’ll get more chances to create better ones in the future- Hannibal has always volunteered to help him hone his craft with a glee that is hitched closer to obsession than excitement, but Will sees it for what it really is.

It’s the same as the wordless submission to Will’s design, the same as the way Hannibal leans into his touch as if he would perish should he be deprived of it- the same as Hannibal letting Will cast them from a cliff and into a churning sea.

When Hannibal is free of all ropes, they lie together atop the sheets with Will following the path of a welt across Hannibal’s chest with a finger. The ropes have indeed left some marks on his lover’s skin- a shifting lattice of various shades of red that Will wants to  _ taste _ , but can’t find the energy to do so.

“No complaints?” He asks at length, and Hannibal’s smile is adoring as he brushes Will’s sweaty curls from his face.

“With you? Never, mylimasis.” He replies, and the way he says it is a benediction.    __

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
